Adyashanti: deep in the belly [emptiness] is centered and grounded

We bring awareness down into the belly where we have our deepest fears and also an access to courageous stability.

Down in the gut, deep in the belly, emptiness is experienced with a greater kind of density and weight. Up in awareness it is spacious and open. Deep in the belly it is centered and grounded.

It is the domain from which courage arises, which will be important when it comes to embodying and expressing what we have realized. Let your body experience that deep groundedness and courage.

– Adyashanti, The Way of Liberating Insight

Emptiness can be experienced or understood in different ways. Here are some ways I experience it:

I notice the boundless space that’s outside and inside the body, and outside and inside of any bodily density or contraction. This is a hint of emptiness.

Sensations (and other sensory experiences along with imagination) are experienced as awareness, awakeness, consciousness, or space. (These words don’t really mean the same, but one or several may resonate or help with a shift in noticing.) They are made of up awareness.

Sensory experiences and imagination are “transparent” to awareness (awakeness, consciousness, space). This is similar to an animation where something fades and the background is shown through an object. The objects are any content of experience, and the “background” as awareness, consciousness, space. Again, this is a hint of emptiness.

When velcro is relaxed or falls away – for instance through inquiry – there is an experience of the emptiness of what previously seeemed so solid and real. The imagination and sensations may still be there, but now without a sense of charge, solidity or reality.